The Boulder City Council retreat continues 9 a.m. Monday at Rembrandt Yard, 1301 Spruce St. It is open to the public, though there is not an opportunity for public comment.

Follow Camera reporter Erica Meltzer on Twitter at @meltzere for live coverage.

Drivers, bus passengers and cyclists will move around Boulder with equal ease. There will be plenty of housing for people who work in Boulder. University Hill will have a diversity of businesses that appeal to residents, students and visitors.

Existing rules will be enforced to protect quality of life. City policies will provide an adequate social safety net for people who fall on hard times while discouraging certain behaviors associated with transients. City open space will be used more for agriculture, and parks will feature edible landscapes.

That was the vision for Boulder laid out Sunday during the first of two days of the City Council's annual retreat. The agenda called for the first part of the retreat to focus on big-picture goals and definitions of success and for Monday's discussion to delve more into policy proposals. A facilitator repeatedly pulled the debate back to the "what" as it kept drifting to the "how."

There was broad agreement on the "what." Social services/homelessness, housing, transportation, climate commitment, local food, the arts, open space and livability were identified as top priorities by the council members.

The "how" discussions that kept breaking out gave insight into the some of the policy debates to come.

Councilwoman Lisa Morzel said the city needs to reconsider its occupancy limits that prevent more than three unrelated people from living together in most areas.

That could open the way for more housing options for seniors outside nursing homes and more cooperative housing for artists, writers and young professionals.

Councilman Andrew Shoemaker said lack of enforcement of the occupancy limit on the Hill means landlords willing to skirt the rules can price out families.

Councilman Macon Cowles said the city could look at ways to create two or three units within a larger home to allow more people to live in them while maintaining the limits.

On transportation issues, Councilwoman Suzanne Jones is a big supporter of a communitywide Eco Pass to promote more use of buses. Boulder Mayor Matt Appelbaum thinks Eco Pass is unlikely to be financially feasible.

Cowles wants to see parking placed under the umbrella of transportation and close attention paid to the way parking creates incentives to drive.

Councilman George Karakehian said providing adequate parking is a key part of revitalizing University Hill, just as it was downtown.

Shoemaker said the city needs to take more initiative in identifying sites that could be redeveloped for affordable and workforce housing.

Appelbaum said Boulder always will be an employment center, and that carries significant benefits for the city. The only way to reduce in-commuting is to have fewer jobs in Boulder, which wouldn't be a good thing.

There was broad agreement that regional connectivity, including bus rapid transit not only on U.S. 36 but also on the Diagonal Highway, and increased enforcement around quality of life issues, especially in densely populated areas like University Hill, were important to achieving the council's vision.

Appelbaum said council members should be careful not to take an idea that sounds good and assume that's the best solution.

"To me, the ifs are, 'Can you afford it? What are the trade-offs?'" he said. "I think sometimes we rush into picking the solution that feels right. That is what City Councils do. It gives us something to shoot for. But we need to be cautious about picking solutions."

City Council members also identified policy initiatives they would like to see happen this year, though they don't fall under specific goal categories.

Boulder needs to have a policy on trash storage that protects bears, Morzel said. The City Council is scheduled to discuss that issue at its Jan. 21 meeting.

Cowles wants to see smoking banned in all city parks and hard-surface open space. The city is currently taking public comment on a city manager's rule to ban smoking across the municipal campus, from Arapahoe Avenue to Canyon Boulevard and from Ninth Street to 13th Street.

Karakehian said the council needs to keep working to make meetings shorter. Meetings that go past midnight aren't fair to the staff or the public and don't lead to good decisions, he said.

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